Every Secret in Red Dead Redemption 2's New Trailer

While the thing most people probably took away from Rockstar’s latest trailer for Red Dead Redemption 2 is this shot of a young John Marston (protagonist of the original Red Dead Redemption, for the uninitiated) with his famed facial scars being clearly very recently sewn.

A young John Marston in the third trailer for Red Dead Redemption 2.

This isn't just a cool nod to the original game, but it also comes smack dab in the middle of this moment with Arthur, John and Dutch which really exemplifies the conflicted tone that we can probably expect to see throughout the story - what's the right move? Where should their loyalties lie? How can these people survive together?

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There are a lot of moments that showcase this internal conflict that we see within the gang, and we go over them - along with several of the new characters and locations - in the video above; but there are so many details, both ones we learned from our time with the game and team at Rockstar North as well as from our own rabid fandom, that we wanted to make sure we discussed as well.

00:01-00:11 - The Train Job

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The opening of this trailer shows us what could be a big update over the last game - train heists. While there were a few train-themed missions in the original Redemption and Undead Nightmare, this looks to be a heist on a whole new level.

The train that Dutch, Arthur and the others are holding up here appears to be pretty well armored - the body is constructed of what looks like heavy-duty steel or iron, and you can see plated windows and something that may be like a gun loop (firing port) on the right-hand side. While in the past, our options were to try and hold up individual passengers, it seems our targets may be considerably more lucrative (or explosive) this time around.

I also want to point out the motion on the barrel of Dutch's revolver (we initially thought it was a highly customized LeMat, but upon closer inspection I believe it's a Schofield - what say you?). Looking closely, you'll see the cylinder spin within the frame, which isn't happening just because it's a cutscene - all of the weapon parts are independently rendered and act appropriately during gameplay. It may not be a huge deal to some, but it's a tiny detail that I really appreciate - you can see this again during the duel at the 01:50 mark.

00:24 - Thundering Hooves

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This particularly nice bit of slow motion gameplay and the racing past the camera that follows not only shows off some fancy lighting, but it also shows us all of the members of the gang who appeared in the original Red Dead - you've got Dutch right behind Arthur, next to him is Sadie Adler, another outlaw who we see more of in this and the previous trailer; behind her is John Marston riding alongside Bill Williamson, a fighter by the name of Charles Smith behind them, and then bringing up the rear is Javier Escuela.

00:40 - Love Yourself a (Camp) Fire

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In addition to being a gorgeous bit of in-engine gameplay and a spotlight for Hosea Matthews, possibly the oldest (likely even older than Uncle, who can be seen next to Arthur at 00:44) member of Dutch's gang, it's also worth noting that this entire story/interaction is entirely optional. During our demo we saw several conversations like this one, and you can choose to partake in them or not.

00:55 - The Horse Whisperer

Another gameplay moment that shows off one of the odd jobs you can take that returns from RDR1 - horse breaking.

00:58 - Valentine

This quaint little town is known as Valentine, in a region called New Hanover - we know because we robbed their bank (sorry, Valentine). There's a bunch of NPCs in this quick snippet of gameplay, you can see the newsboy selling papers and the beggar in the bottom left, plus the several people walking around - according to the conversations we had, these pedestrians all have their own routines and their own chores, errands and jobs to do. The guy walking across the foreground likely has somewhere to be, and the NPC in the white shirt towards the back-left is likely coming out of the bank, which is the building on the left side of the street with all the horses hitched out front.

We see the inside of the bank, plus Arthur's pal Lenny during said heist, at 01:13 (we see other moments from it in the second trailer as well)...

...and this daring leap in front of the speeding train at 01:46 was part of the gang's escape from the robbery (after the Law inevitabely showed up).

There's a second shot of the main street, taken just outside the bank. From left to right is Javier Escuela, Arthur Morgan, Bill Williamson, Charles Smith (you may recognize him from the last trailer, he was offering to help Arthur with a job) and Dutch.

Dirty Money

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We get a sense of some of the ways we might enrich ourselves at the expense of others in a few different gameplay clips, such as when we these riders chasing down a train at 01:18...

...or this stagecoach at 01:22.

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We also see Charles in this back-alley brawl, but given that there's a crowd cheering I think it's a safe bet that this might be a way to earn a hard dollar or two.

Back in Blackwater

During this rough-and-touble clip of gameplay around 01:30, we thought we recognized the building in the background as one of the structures near the train station in Blackwater.

And then we definitely recognized the street behind this new antagonist at 01:35 - you can see the sign at the top of the large stone building behind him reads "Blackwater Grand Theatre," where we could watch movies in RDR1, as well as the trademark green awning of the Blackwater Hotel and Saloon down at the end of the street.

Given that we know we'll be seeing Blackwater again, it's a safe bet that we'll likely get to revisit other areas of at least West Elizabeth (like Great Plains, perhaps show in this moment at 01:08?), if not New Austin as well.